C of K is up at Heavy Medal, the mock Newbery blog

[ccwtaylor.livejournal.com]

Heavy Medal is pretty much the top mock Newbery blog, and today book, kicking off the new season, is Conspiracy of Kings. http://blog.schoollibraryjournal.com/heavymedal/2010/09/17/conspiracy-of-kings/

The two big questions: does it fit the audience age criteria, and does it "stand alone?"

Comments

[beth-shulman.livejournal.com]

As much as I want MWT to win a Newbery, I don't think the book stands on its own.

[elvenjaneite.livejournal.com]

Ditto this. I think KoA could have (which is part of why its lack of Newbery makes me mad), but I'm not convinced that CofK would make any sense read out of order. On the other hand, Jonathan Hunt did have some fairly persuasive comments on that entry.

(Edited for stupid grammar error.)

[checkers65477.livejournal.com]

Huh, and I feel the opposite--that ACoK can stand on its own merits even more than KoA, because of the first part which is entirely Sophos's story as he is kidnapped and made a slave. By the time the other characters appear the reader has been made a part of Sophos's world and can, I believe, appreciate the book perfectly well. But brandypainter has it right--nowhere does it say that Newbery books have to be entirely separate story--it doesn't say that.

Here's what it DOES say:

The committee in its deliberations is to consider only the books eligible for the award, as specified in the terms.

The term, “only the books eligible for the award,” specifies that the committee is not to consider the entire body of the work by an author or whether the author has previously won the award. The committee’s decision is to be made following deliberation about the books of the specified calendar year.

So yeah, the terms say only that the committee can't bring up and discuss the other books as a reason as to why this book should be considered.

It's a shame that that term "stand alone" is used when discussing the Newbery, since it's not really accurate. But, again, I'm going to echo brandypainter below that J. Hunt said all this much better than I.

[elvenjaneite.livejournal.com]

I do definitely agree with the bulk of this--that the "stand alone" clause is being interpreted too literally. BUT at the same time, I guess I feel like if one of the currently published Attolia books were to win a Newbery, it should be KoA.

I guess I just felt like CofK relied so much on our impressions of the characters from other books, even more than KoA did. I'd love to hear if anyone read CofK first, and if so what they thought of it.

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

I guess I just felt like CofK relied so much on our impressions of the characters from other books, even more than KoA did.

That's how I felt, too. Checkers was much better at reading it objectively (see: the fact that the first half of the book is basically all about Sophos and you don't need to know anything else for that), but I felt like most of the fun of the middle part of the book came from knowing Eugenides and Eddis and Attolia and the magus so well, and watching them get to be themselves.

side note: I LOVE your icon. Oh my goodness. It's just so simple, and removed, and beautiful.

[elvenjaneite.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's exactly how I felt!

Oh, thanks. It's one of my favorite lines from the whole series, actually.

[checkers65477.livejournal.com]

I'd love to hear from people who read ACoK first. Plus, it would be interesting to go back and reread it while looking for parts that depended on your understanding the other books to make sense of. Gah, wish I had time to do that!

I also felt KoA was more young-adulty, because it focused so much on the marriage, and wasn't as linear, going back and forth in time in the telling of the story. In a way, ACoK is a much simpler story, with complexities in there for those who catch them. Even then, you can still love the book without catching all the different levels of the story.

WANT TO REREAD. NOW.

[beth-shulman.livejournal.com]

I actually read KoA first, so as much as there were things I didn't get (like exactly what a "Thief" was), it was definitely understandable. ACoK - I kept stopping and going "Oh! Oh! That's a reference to (whatever)!"

[brandy-painter.livejournal.com]

I liked what Jonathan Hunt had to say on the stand alone issue as well. And I agree with him. Some parts might be a little confusing but confusion is not always a bad thing. And I also agree with him that too many books are being eliminated from consideration altogether by misinterpretation of the Newbery criteria and the application of the term "stand alone". But he basically said all I would on the subject and far more eloquently.

[drashizu.livejournal.com]

As always, I hope MWT wins the award, but I'm sort of undecided as to whether I really think CoK can make it. It's not that it doesn't deserve it, because I think even on its own it's wonderfully done, but, like KoA, it seems to me that it's at an instant disadvantage in the Newbury discussions because it's part of a series and people will assume that what they don't understand, must have been said earlier in the series.

I really want to get the opinion of someone who read ACoK before discovering the rest of the series. What was the reading process like? Were you confused? Did Attolia scare you? Were you surprised that Sophos was bada$$? I can't remember if we discussed this back in March, or not.